MAKE THE MOST OF EVERY OPPORTUNITY

Boys Basketball Practice – Thursday Dec 20

This is the last time we will get together before the Christmas break and it proved to be another solid practice.  Daniel Zangmeister captured the top spot on the Free Throw Ladder by edging Mitch Moore 5 – 4.  Daniel is the 7th different player to hold the top spot and will try to defend this position when he takes on Nate Johnson.  Nate shoots 83% from the free throw line so Daniel will have his work cut out for him.  No player on the team made less than 4 free throws which is a dramatic improvement over the first part of the season.  You can see a steady improvement in shooting form and confidence with every practice.

We held our first jump rope competition, something I am sure most of these players thought they would never be a part of.  The players had 5 minutes to see how many times they could jump without missing.  Nate Johnson lead the way with 200 followed by Daniel Zangmeister with 140 and Caleb Robinson with 99.   This is a marked improvement over a couple of days ago, however to put this in perspective, Coach Scott started at the 3 minute mark and jumped 500 times and only stopped because the horn sounded ending the competition.  This is where we want the players to be by the end of the season.  A jump rope was sent home with each player and we asked them to find 10 – 15 minutes to practice everyday.  We will run the competition at our first practice in January and the results should show another improvement.

The team huddle centered around making the most of every opportunity.  Coach Scott asked the players to think about a question over the holidays.  When is the last time you went the extra mile?  Team huddles are designed around lessons in life rather than basketball.  The player’s focus and attention sometimes drifts during practice but it is amazing to watch them during the team huddle.  Every eye is glued on Coach Scott, not a word is missed.

We implemented our third offensive play and the players caught on very quickly.  All three of our plays were used during the scrimmage.  Several times one of the plays was run to perfection.  This has been a huge area of improvement since our first game.

We will not practice again until January 2 (there is a shoot around Dec 28 that is optional).  The entire coaching staff would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.  We pray that God will keep everyone safe until we can get together again.  May God bless you all.

DOES GOD CARE WHO WINS – PART 2

Boys Basketball Practice – Wednesday, December 19

Practice started out as normal with 10 minutes of stretching before we moved to our first drill, a full court slide pass.  This drill is designed to loosen up the players legs while developing good solid passes.  Within the first few seconds of this drill you could already see that the intensity was back, the players were focused.  My first thought was;”this is going to be a great practice”, which proved to be true.

We ran our Tar Heel Drill which is shooting at 6 designated locations and touching the center line between shots.  Six players set personal bests:  Alan Fox, Nate Johnson, Caleb Robinson, Daniel Zangmeister, Ryan Brown, and Joel VanDusen.  A new team guideline was implemented.  If more than half the team sets a personal best in this competition, we will not run conditioning at the end of practice.

The players are still practicing their jump rope and did show signs of improvement.  Coach Scott has decided to send the jump ropes home with each of the players after Thursday’s practice so they can practice during the Christmas break.

Mitch Moore became the first player to succesfully defend the top spot on the Free Throw Ladder.  Mitch hit 8 of 10 shots and will take on Daniel Zangmeister at the next practice.  Caleb Farmer and Nate Johnson both hit 7 of 10 shots and will move up.  Free Throw shooting is showing steady improvement, we just need to figure out how to get to the line during the game.

“Does God Care Who Wins” is a 40 hour class that Coach Scott reduced to about 4 minutes and I am going to reduce even more.  We do everything to the glory of God.  God sees the big picture, we do not.  The outcome of any sporting event has a significant impact on the lives and thoughts of many people.  Coaches, players, fans, parents, schools, students, sports writers, cities, the list can go on and on.  There are lessons to be learned and only God knows what these lessons are.  God cares who wins because of the big picture.  God is not a Panther fan or a Cubs fan but He uses sports to get his message across.

Practice ended with a 40 minute scrimmage.  This was the first time you could actually see the players running our offensive plays and blocking out on rebounding.  As I stated earlier, this was not only a good practice but also a fun practice.

DOES GOD CARE WHO WINS

Boys Basketball Practice – Monday, Dec 17

Monday practices are limited to half court which means the central theme is conditioning and implementation of new plays.  We noticed during our game last week that our players would lose their man on a pick or a screen.  The primary goal of a man to man defense is to stay with your man.  Coach Scott showed the players how to switch from the man they are guarding to the one their teammate is guarding.  He also showed them how to slide through the screen while continuing to guard your man.  The players caught on immediately to the “switch” but we still have work to do on the “slide through”.

We have a drill that has 2 players shooting at the same basket from 2 or 3 feet away and moving in a semi circle around the basket.  We run 2 sets with each set lasting two minutes.  Joel VanDusen lead all players by hitting 100 shots in 4 minutes.  Matthew Pedemonte was a very close 2nd by knocking down 97.  Nate Johnson shot from 10 – 12 feet away and still made 72 baskets.

While this drill was going on, the players not shooting were given jump ropes.  That was quite an experience.  It is obvious that the boys basketball team has not spent much time with a jump rope.  I am willing to bet that the girls team at the other end of the floor probably would have done a little better.  Parents will be glad to know that by the end of the season all of our players will look like they were born with a jump rope in their hand.

Coach Scott asked the players one question during the team huddle, “Does God care who wins”?  The players were given some time to think and then everyone offered the same point of view.  God does not care who wins.  Coach Scott surprised them by saying he disagreed with all of them but would not say why.  Instead each player was asked to think about this and discuss it with their parents.  So parents, does God care who wins?  We will get Coach Scott’s reasoning at Wednesday’s practice.

 We have one offensive play which was reviewed and our second play was implemented.  We are making progress in this area but we are not there yet.  We ran the 10 ball circle drill which I really like.   The drill takes approximately 10 – 12 minutes to complete and the final players have completed close to 50 push ups while staying in constant motion either running or moving around the circle.  Hank Booth snaged the last ball a split second before Joel VanDusen.  Mitch Moore, the previous winner, came in 3rd.  These 3 players were excused from end of practice running.  As each player dropped out of the competition he was handed a jump rope with the idea that they would complete their conditioning by continuously jumping rope.  Both Coach Scott and I noticed there was not much effort put forth by the players when it comes to jumping rope.  In effect, the players chose to run rather than end practice the way we had envisioned.

This was not one of our better practices.  On a scale of 1-10 we may sneak out with a 5.  The focus was not there.  There were a lot of outside distractions and we are only  a week from Christmas.  There is so much going on in everyone’s life right now that keeping your eye on the ball can be difficult.  Wednesday’s practice will be better.  

DAY OF PERSONAL BESTS

Boys Basketball Practice – Wednesday, Dec 12

The first practice after a game usually provides insight to the team’s attitude.  Did they learn anything from the game?  How will they respond to the coaches?  How hard will they work?  The boys responded well, coming out eager and ready to learn.  This was possibly our best practice of the year.  As for attitude, the entire team was disappointed we do not have practice scheduled for Thursday.

We did a litle too much dribbling during our game on Tuesday and worked on passing and finding the open man.  A game of “football” followed the 3 man weave  and the beginning of an outstanding practice was underway.

Mitch Moore moved to the top of the free throw ladder sinking 4 of 10 free throws.  This is Mitch’s first time on top and will defend against Ryan Brown.  Ryan hit 6 free throws and will attempt to move to the top for his first time.  Nate Johnson set a new team high and a new personal best making all 10 free throws.

Now practice really got interesting.  The Tar Heel Drill is our 6 point shooting and speed drill and is used to measure each player’s progress.  Players have a chance to be excused from conditioning at the end of practice if they can establish new personal bests in number of shots made and the time it takes to make them.   Each player must make at least 3 of the 6 shots to qualify.  Nate Johnson established a new team best making 5 shots in 36:56 seconds.  Matthew Pedemonte just missed making all 6 shots and smashed his previous best.  Hank Booth, Caleb Farmer, Caleb Robinson, Ryan Brown, and Joel VanDusen all set new personal bests.  

Tuesday’s game showed us we have some work to do in rebounding, which means we need to become more agressive.  We tried a new drill with this in mind.  This drill is similar to musical chairs except we use balls instead of chairs.  10 players move around the center circle with only 9 balls in the middle.  On the whistle, the players are required to sprint to the side line, do 5 push ups and return for a ball.  The player without the ball moves to the side and works on line jumps.  When a player leaves the competition a ball leaves with him.  This proved to be a spirited and highly competitive drill.  Mitch Moore and Caleb Farmer were the last two left in the circle with one ball.   Mitch completed his push ups first and looked like certain victory.  As he reached for the ball Caleb came flying into the circle and tried to wrestle the ball fom Mitch.  Mitch hung on and prevailed but not without a good amount of effort and a moment of doubt.   What a great drill.   What a great practice. 

ARBORBROOK PLAYS FIRST BASKETBALL GAME IN SCHOOL’S HISTORY

Tuesday, December 11, 2007 was a historical day for the Sports Department of Arborbrook Christian Academy.  The boys basketball team competed in its first game ever taking on Garr Christian Academy at the Garr Sports Complex.

The bleachers were filled with the majority of the fans coming from Arborbrook.  We have 11 players on the team and each player had at least one parent in attendance which is outstanding.  The girls basketball team and many other students were there to offer their support.  The players and the coaches would like to thank everyone that attended, it was nice to play in front of a full gym.

The players were nervous, the coaches were nervous, and I know the parents were nervous.  Coach Scott tried to get everyone relaxed but you could feel the tension in the air.  We were playing an experienced team in their 4th game on their home floor and many of our players had never competed in a basketball game.  The stage was set.

Matthew Pedemonte scored the first points in Arborbrook history on a 12 foot jump shot just left of the lane.  The shot was true the moment it left his hand.   Matthew’s shot tied the score at 2 and would prove to be the closest we would come the rest of the game.  Garr proved to be too experienced and our inexperience showed throughout the first half.  Nate Johnson, our tallest and fastest player had picked up 3 fouls and was riding the bench.  We trailed 26 – 10 going into the second half.

The 3rd quarter did not start out well and did not end well but you could see the player’s confidence starting to build.   We scored only 2 points and trailed 39 – 12 but we actually played better.  The shots would not drop.

The confidence carried over to the 4th quarter and you could see what type of team this would become.  Garr continued to play their starting five and we not only outscored them 10 – 8 but we also outplayed them.  Caleb Farmer made the play of the game on a driving layup that was part of a 6-0 run.  When Caleb is on the floor he will always be the smallest player.  Caleb drove around and through players 6-12 inches taller and hit a shot he has hit many times in practice.  His confidence was back .  Nate Johnson ended up as our leading scorer with 8 points.

The final score was 47 – 22 which only means we have a starting point.  We did not score the most points on the scoreboard but we won in every other way possible.  The players, the coaches, and the fans represented the team, the school, and God very well.  Everyone played and each player made at least one good play.   We can build from this.  I rode home with Coach Scott after the game and we discussed everything.  We would like to thank the parents and the school for trusting us with their sons.  You can only have one first game and Coach Scott and I were proud to be a part this experience.